August 28, 2017

its a doxey thing

hello hello! we just got back from family vacation! aka family "staycation" meaning we all went home to our house for a week. i didn't go the full week, i went thursday - sunday because mama's got to work. it was really hard because taran was in park city for his company's annual conference so we were apart for four days which is a long time for us! i know, you want to get out the world's tiniest violin, but that is a long time for us and it was really, really hard. but we did it! taran joined me on friday.

the best part of the trip was that i got to finally meet my newest nephew moses! he was just shy of 3 months old and i fell so hard crazy in love with him. he is the smiliest, sweetest, most talkative baby out there and i am so, so in love with him.

he is a very bad sleeper and didn't take a very long nap and was getting fussy so i rocked him and sang "edelweiss" and managed to get him to sleep. we were heading out to the lake and while my sister was putting her other 3 kids in the car i put a blanket over him and he just slept on me for about 15 minutes and it was absolute heaven. then i managed to transfer him to his carseat without waking him up! success!

guys! isn't he so fat and chunky and cute? i love him so, so much!

all 10 of my nicephews love playing with each other and get so excited when we all get together. they have so much fun. my mom made these shirts that say "cousins make the best friends" and we did a photoshoot with all of them together and it was adorable. i'm so glad they are all friends and close in age.

later that day, we went to the lake. in the summertime in my family, thats what we do, we go to the lake. we got a boat when i was 14 and man have we worn and torn the crap out of that thing! since there were so many of us and not all of us could fit on the boat, we took turns and set up a spot on the beach. it was a great day. we supervised the kids as they played with shovels and buckets in the sand and continuously applied sunscreen on them, then switch! we did it all over again with another batch of niecephews.

my niece vienna and i chilling on the beach

me riding the tube with my sweet nephew oliver and my niece avery. they did not want to go outside the wake and wanted to go slow. they are four days apart in age and are 5. they are so adorable. oliver's little hands as he held on so tightly to the handles with his adorable cheeks that i just wanted to cover in kisses. avery is usually so fierce and brave to the point we are all afraid for her but she really really didn't want to go fast and and she really really didn't want to go outside the wake. tubing can be scary for my babies!

i went on the tube with my bigger boys as well, lincoln and eli, and they wanted to go outside the wake and go fast and i was so impressed. like i said, i have been going to the lake since i was 14, so i have been tubing for 13 years and have it down to a science. i got to show them how to lean the opposite way when going over a wake and it was really fun but i did not want them to fall off. i held onto them real tight!

that night we had a surprise baby shower for my sister rachelle. it is her first boy! i'm so glad we did it for her and were able to make her feel special. it was small, just my sisters and i, my mom, and two family friends. i think once moms are on their second child, its easy for their loved ones to slip up and forget to treat the unborn baby as special as they would the first. but we need to! each child is just as special and each pregnancy is just as special. i was so glad we were able to get some things for the baby and celebrate baby james!

the next day taran finally arrived! my family went to pine valley to hike, a little place north of saint george where we used to have a cabin. taran was on his way down from park city, and i wasn't able to go or else i would miss his arrival. nonetheless, my babies are cute so i must include pictures.

my brother in law carrying 2/3 of his children. haha.

must pack suckers on hikes to keep children happy!

this was our cabin when i was growing up! we would go there all the time and i have such good memories there. we had our dog max when we had the cabin and it was his absolute favorite place. behind the cabin was a hill that he would run down with a stream at the bottom. no matter if it was summer or winter and the water was below freezing, he would swim in it and bark at all the fish and try to catch them. he would roll around and play in the snow. when we hiked, he would always walk ahead of us to make sure everything was alright for us. he always looked out for us. the cabin was his kingdom. there was a tiny little attic in the cabin that i thought was so cool that i would always sleep in with my sister whenever we stayed. we would eat dinner late and stay up talking at the fireplace. we would play games as a family and it was a rare occasion that my oldest sisters weren't fighting, a very rare time then, haha. i loved that cabin!

my babies "helping" my mom make cupcakes that night.

my parents made us shirts too! i love they always do this. they did this four years ago at our last staycation!

the next day we went to the lake again!

the kids are so cute on the tube!

my dad being funny with his grandkids.

the beach!

my niece wanted a picture of us girls. so cute.

look how awesome taran is on the tube!

i have a season pass to universal studio, and the day before i left for the trip, i went there with a friend. we were in honeydukes and i thought it would be fun if i had the kids try bertie botts every flavored beans. at first they were only asking for the good flavors. but then they got into it and got brave tasting the bad flavors!

lincoln was so cute when he did it. we gave him sausage and he was completely fine with it. he held up his finger, chewed, then nonchalantly said "it tastes like meat."

of course we had to take pictures in our shirts!

my neck look so weird in these pictures. the photographer was on practically on the ground to be at level with the kids to get their attention, so i was trying to look down without looking like i had multiple chins. it was awkward.